Tom De Haven | |
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| Born | 1949 (age 75–76) Bayonne, New Jersey, U.S. |
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| Nationality | American |
| Education | Rutgers University Bowling Green State University (MFA) |
Tom De Haven (born 1949) is an Americanauthor,editor,journalist, andwriting teacher. His recurring subjects include literary andfilm noir, theHollywood studio system and the American comics industry. De Haven is noted for his comics-themed novels, including theDerby Dugan trilogy andIt's Superman!.
De Haven was born inBayonne, New Jersey.[1] He attendedCatholic school, where he was a classmate of fellow authorGeorge R. R. Martin, though he notes that they weren't friends, even though Martin was an editor of the school newspaper where he was acartoonist.[2]
De Haven originally wanted to be a cartoonist before attending college,[3] but by the time he graduated from the university, he realized that he would never be a professional cartoonist, and considers the realization "the First Great Disappointment of My Life".[2] He received aSociology degree fromRutgers University in 1971 and anMFA fromBowling Green State University in 1973.
An avid reader ofcomic books andgraphic novels, De Haven considers himself anarrative writer, and considers the storytelling style of comics to have been a major influence on his writing since he was a child of almost six or seven.[3]
He began teaching creative writingpart-time atHofstra University in 1981, before moving in 1987 to Rutgers to teachAmerican Studies (including one of the first college courses on American comics) before relocating to Richmond, Virginia to become afull-time teacher.
De Haven is currently[when?] a full professor of Creative Writing atVirginia Commonwealth University inRichmond, Virginia in the MFA program, and often teaches at least one American Studies course, including "The Graphic Novel".[2] De Haven is also the co-creator with author Laura Browder of theVCU Cabell First Novelist Award, honoring the best debut novel published during a calendar year. He is also a licensed private investigator.[citation needed] He considers himself aDemocrat, and has been criticized for anti-Republican statements he has made over the years.[1]
The author noted in an interview that he agreed withRobert Crumb's observation that the Thirties was the pinnacle of American culture. He also notes in the same interview that he finds truth toArt Spiegelman's statement "that we are, for whatever reason, most nostalgic for the decade before the one we were born in", as he was born in the Forties.[1]
As a freelance journalist, he has writtencriticism for publications such asTheNew York Times Book Review andEntertainment Weekly. De Haven's novels include theFunny Paper trilogy (consisting ofFunny Papers (1985),Derby Dugan's Depression Funnies (1996) andDugan Under Ground (2001)). The trilogy'sstoryline stretches from the beginnings of the newspapercomic strips in the 1890s to the 1970s.
TheNew York Times Book Review called theDerby Dugan books "a mighty accomplishment:John Dos Passos'sU.S.A. trilogy for comicgeeks."[4]TheBoston Globe hails the trilogy as a "wild ride".[5]
In 2005, his novelIt's Superman! reinvented the early years of the well-known superhero of the same name amidst theGreat Depression. The author noted his initial apprehension when he was contacted byDC Comics in 1997 in regards to writing a novel aboutSuperman: "[S]hould I do a novel with a character that I don't own? So I had to think about it, but I didn't think about it very long, really. I just thought [...] this is too good to let go [...] they were giving mecarte blanche."[3] He states that his prior novels about comic strips are what prompted DC to contact him about writing theperiod piece. For the novel, he took as his inspiration the early Superman stories of the 1930s through the 1950s, in which the hero is less concerned with super-villains and Lex Luthor and more with clearing slums in theNew Deal era and exposing corrupt politicians.[3] De Haven says he was aiming for his hero to develop a social conscience during the Great Depression. His only intentional departure from creators'Jerry Siegel andJoe Shuster conception of the character was to relocate the character fromCleveland, Ohio, where some of the earliest Superman stories had given as his home. De Haven changed this to "Metropolis" ofNew York City.[3]
De Haven's awards include a fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, and he has twice won fellowships from theNational Endowment for the Arts.[6] His novel,Depression Funnies, received anAmerican Book Award in 1997.Dugan Under Ground received theLibrary of Virginia Fiction Award (also called the Library of Virginia Literary Awards).
Novels[edit]Adult fiction[edit]
Children's and Young Adult fiction[edit]
Comics[edit]
Short fiction collections[edit]
Television[edit]
Nonfiction[edit] |
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